Tax plan tomorrow? Rumor is the White House and congressional GOP leaders will unveil their tax plan. President Trump dined with conservatives last night to talk taxes and will head to Indiana Wednesday for a rally to talk up the latest tax blueprint drafted by the Big Six. Many questions remain: How will backers pay for their proposed cuts? How much would the plan help the wealthy? What business sectors might benefit the most? How much detail will we see tomorrow?

Will a tax cut on repatriated earnings help US workers? TPC’s Steve Rosenthal looked at the data, and the answer is no. Tax relief on accumulated foreign earnings of US-based multinational corporations would mostly benefit high-income US taxpayers and foreigners, not rank-and-file US workers.

Whatever happens, small businesses want tax cuts. But they aren’t counting on it. A new CNBC/SurveyMonkey Small Business Survey shows that taxes again top the list of “critical issues.” But only 31 percent expect tax changes will help their business over the next year, while 27 percent think they’ll be worse off.  

And economists aren’t quite as optimistic, either. The National Association for Business Economics surveyed several dozen economists in June and September. The share who believe individual tax reform will be completed by the end of 2018 fell from 83 percent to 73 percent. The same 73 percent are optimistic that corporate tax reform will pass by 2019, down  from 79 percent  in June.

If the tax plan undergoes another revision, here are eight lessons from the 1986 reform effort. TPC’s Gene Steuerle outlines eight lessons that helped shape the Treasury study that led to the Tax Reform Act of 1986. For those too young to remember, that was the only comprehensive base-broadening tax reform in the hundred-plus history of the income tax.

As for the Graham-Cassidy health care bill: Dead before arrival.  Rand Paul and John McCain have been "nos" for days. Last night, Susan Collins joined the list, effectively killing the latest GOP effort to replace the Affordable Care Act. Finance Committee Chair Orrin Hatch, who presided over a hearing on the bill yesterday marked by protests and arrests of people with disabilities, acknowledged the bill wasn’t getting anywhere, even before the Collins announcement. He said it was unlikely that Majority Leader Mitch McConnell would force a floor vote only to experience defeat. Again.